


The Ghost of Sellwood High

by Quips_Toasters



Category: Long Exposure (Webcomic)
Genre: Bullying, Ghosts, M/M, Mystery, Near Death Experiences
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-08 23:23:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11656818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quips_Toasters/pseuds/Quips_Toasters
Summary: When Jonas and Sidney are shifted to a new home after the unexpected death of a former foster parent, they learn to live under the strict rules of the Wagner household. It seems like the only place Jonas could catch a break was at school, but when the rumors of a ghost seem more real than fiction, it's up to the twins to find out who Mitch Mueller was and why he's so intent on haunting Jonas.





	The Ghost of Sellwood High

So much for foster house number eight and counting.

With a heavy sigh, Jonas crammed the last of his shirts into his duffle bag. It was stuffed to the point where it was almost impossible to zip it shut, but he managed. Somewhat.

Sidney sat on the window seat of their room, watching the driveway outside. The agency would be arriving soon to send them to a new foster home. Everything they owned was packed away, save for the furniture they couldn’t take with them. It was a shame; Sam had taken them shopping last weekend. Jonas picked out a neat wooden bookshelf while Sidney had dibs on choosing a low rise couch.

For people who had no experience raising kids, Annabelle and Sam were decent first time foster parents. Sure, Annabelle was overbearing with how often she checked on the twins, and Sam sometimes tried a little too hard to find common interests between them. Annabelle had an obsession with teeth that was only  _ barely _ justified by the fact that she was a dentist, and Sam had a tendency to cut off other people when talking about pretty much anything,  _ especially _ his woodcarving. Both of them were health nuts, but they food they made was pretty good, if not a little… strange. But they were good people, and in the three months that passed, they started being something more than overly anxious first timers. They seemed more real, more stable. Sidney felt like the four of them had chemistry, and if she was the realistic twin to his optimism, then that had to count for something.

If Jonas was honest with himself, maybe they could have been a good family.

And then Wednesday happened.

Sam never saw the truck when he went for his morning run. Or maybe he did at the last second. There weren’t any witnesses at the scene. The driver said that he was only ten miles above the residential speed limit. The meters of skid marks on the street said otherwise. He also said that the light from the sunrise blinded him, despite the fact that it was partly cloudy. The police said that there were a lot of “maybes” in the whole thing, but it didn’t really matter in the end. According to the coroner, the impact was instant. Sam avoided a lot of suffering.

And within a day, not only did Annabelle lose her husband, but the twins lost their foster home. “I’m sorry,” Annabelle sobbed the day after, wiping away tears with an overused tissue, “I can’t do this without him. I can’t. I love you two but logistically it’s not possible, I’m so sorry...”

“They’re here,” said Sidney, shifting her position as a familiar blue sedan rolled into the driveway. “Annnnd… they’re not coming out of the car. Shit, it’s probably Olyssa then.”

“Like being an hour late could be anyone but her. I guess that’s our cue to say goodbye,” said Jonas with a roll of his eyes as he lifted the duffle bag onto his shoulder. “Maybe it’s better this way? You know, privacy?”

“I guess,” said Sidney, picking up her own equally overstuffed bag, “But I kinda don’t want to. At least, not while she’s like this.”

“What do you mean?”

Sidney sighed, dragging a hand over her freckled face. “You’re totally going to take this the wrong way, but I don’t like how much she’s changed. It’s been three days, and it’s like she doesn’t exist anymore.”

Jonas stared at his sister for ten long, long seconds before saying, “She lost her husband, Sid.”

Sidney groaned and dragged a hand over her face. “See? You took it the wrong way! Ugh, it’s not coming out the way I want to say it. I’m not saying she  _ shouldn’t _ be grieving; I guess I never thought it’d be that... intense.” She fell silent as she gave the room one last look before walking past her brother. “I dunno. It’s kinda scary how much you can love a person, and then just have them vanish from your life.”

“Yeah,” whispered Jonas, feeling a pang of sadness when he shut the door. A wooden plaque beautifully etched with his and Sidney’s names hung from the door, and below that, in tiny letters resembling leaves, was the date they moved in. Sam said he’d carve the date they moved out of the house afterwards and give it to them as a memento,  _ “But I hope I don’t have to!” _ he laughed, slapping Jonas’s back.

Jonas decided to leave it and followed his sister downstairs.

“It’s pretty scary.”

Sidney had stopped at the entrance to the kitchen and gave Jonas a pointed look. Standing next to his sister, Jonas watched the former shell of his foster mother. Annabelle sat at the breakfast table, wild red hair frazzled into a three day old bun, with one hand on a photo album and the other holding a cigarette. The coffee Sidney served her for breakfast laid cold and untouched next to her.

“Annabelle?” said Sidney, taking a hesitant step forward, “The agency’s here.”

Two tired, bloodshot eyes glanced at the siblings, a flicker of life barely flashing through them.

“Oh. Yeah. That’s today, isn’t it?” Annabelle said nonchalantly, taking one last drag of smoke before snuffing it out on the ashtray filled with a dozen cigarette butts. She glanced down at the photo album one last time before closing it; Jonas saw that it was a wedding portrait. “You’ve got everything? Clothes, toothbrushes, knickknacks?”

“We’ve got everything,” said Sidney.

“Are you gonna be okay Annabelle?” asked Jonas, and Annabelle responded with an unsure, shaky smile.

“No? I… I still need time. To process this. All of this. I keep feeling like this is all a bad dream, and that I’m going to wake up soon, but I know it’s not. I really am sorry I can’t let you guys stay, but…” She stood up from the table and walked to give both Sidney and Jonas tight hugs. “I’ll miss you two. Keep in touch and floss daily, ‘kay?”

Sidney gave a soft laugh, and Jonas patted her shoulder.

“Yeah, we will.”

“Bye, Annabelle.”

“See you kiddos.”

Sometimes it was easy leaving a house. Number three was one of those; the Hawkins barely acknowledged their presence. And number five’s foster family worked so often that sometimes it felt like they were barely home. But this wasn’t one of those times. As Jonas walked through the front door for the last time, he could only try to ignore the faint cry from the kitchen as he left foster home eight and went to begin number nine.

\---

The car ride to Sellwood was long and uneventful. Their case manager, Olyssa, only offered condolences for their loss; she was “so sure” that the Tudelas were going to be a long term family and it was “rather unfortunate” that the death occurred. But they didn’t have to worry too much; the next house had  _ years _ of experience with foster kids and were beyond delighted to host Jonas and Sidney.

They stopped in the heartland of suburbia; hundreds of white, tan, and warms gray homes neatly settled in a maze of residential streets. Occasionally, they differed by lawn ornaments or mailboxes, but the house they parked at was immaculately perfect at being unremarkable. There was no outside decor or toys, no porchside furniture, no neatly trimmed hedges. It seemed to be more of a model house than an actual living place.

Olyssa chatted away as Jonas and Sidney followed her to the front door, bracelets clinking against each other as her hands flew to illustrate her words.

“-and honestly this is probably  _ the _ safest street, if not home, in the neighborhood, and I know the local high school offers plenty of advanced courses for you Jonas, so you should be able to jump back in with no problem, and Sidney you’re going to love the- Sue! Hello!”

A short, brown haired woman peeked from behind the door, opening it wider when she who knocked on the door. “Hello Olyssa,” she said softly, offering a warm, if not somewhat timid, smile to the case manager before turning kind eyes onto the twins. “You must be Sidney and Jonas. Please, come inside.”

The inside of the house was spacious and clean, with several photographs of dozens of different kids hanging on the walls. A few “Live, Laugh, Love” and “God Bless this Home” decorations spread were spread on the hallway tables, and a cross hung above the entryway to the living room. There was a pleasant smell that hung around the house, like a pine scented candle mixed with chocolate chip cookies. The extra-chocolate kind.

“Please excuse the mess,” said Sue, leading them into the near-spotless living room. “All of the kids are in school, so it’s just us for a while.”

“Where’s Dean?” asked Olyssa, pulling out a stuffed manilla folder from her bag.

“Ah, he had an emergency call,” said Sue, gesturing the twins to sit down while offering them a plate of cookies from a nearby table, “He’s also on night shift tonight, so you two get to meet him tomorrow.”

Olyssa frowned, adjusting her glasses to peer at the older woman. “Sue, you know we like having both foster parents at the first meeting.”

“Yes,” replied Sue, taking a seat in a red armchair, “And you know that Dean and I have very busy schedules due to the nature of our work, and like having our case managers be on time.”

The sudden, unexpected edge to Sue’s voice made Olyssa blink, and she coughed into her hand, somewhat taken aback by the response. “Yeah, sorry about that. Court case went overtime; I meant to call you at the recess, but I must have forgotten. There’s actually another case at four, and the drive’s a bit long so I better head out now. You know the drill Sue, so I’ll just leave you with their file. Sid! Jo! I’ll check in on you guys next month! Here’s hoping!” With a sheepish smile and slightly pink cheeks, she left the house, sedan starting up barely ten seconds later.

“Damn, rekt,” whispered Sidney to Jonas, who tried his best not to snicker. Olyssa was a nice case manager (really), but it was somewhat gratifying to see someone call her out for being late all the time for pretty much everything. Sue smiled at them, idly thumbing through the file.

“I heard about what happened to your previous foster home,” she said, eyes quickly scanning over every page, “I’m sorry for what you two must have gone through.”

“Yeah,” said Jonas, scratching his head, “Sam was pretty cool.”

“He was the kind of guy that could be friends with anyone,” said Sidney, grabbing another cookie.

“Well, I’ll be sure to include a prayer for him and his wife. Let me properly introduce myself. My name is Suzanne Wagner, but please call me Sue. Dean is my husband; he’s a police officer at the nearby station. He’d usually be here for first time meetings, but I suppose emergencies always pop up at inconvenient times.”

“You said you had kids, right?” asked Jonas.

“Yes, there’s six others, but they’re all much younger than you; I believe you two are the only ones in high school. You’ll get to know them in a few hours. Why don’t I give you a tour of the house and show you to your rooms?”

Sue seemed nice enough; as she showed them the kitchen, bathrooms, and garage, she explained why she chose to set up a Christian based foster care home and how happy she was to have Sidney and Jonas around. Dean was a bit like caviar in that he was an “acquired taste”, but Sue said that he just tended to be stressed from work a lot and really had all of the kids’ best interests at heart.

“So don’t be too surprised if he seems a little gruff, you’ll come around to him in to time,” she said, finishing the tour at the second floor of the house. “Sidney, Jonas, the last two rooms down the hall are yours. Why don’t you two take a look and unpack a bit? I need to check on dinner ingredients. Make a list of whatever you might need for school tomorrow and we can make a quick stop to an office store before the elementary kids come back.”

“Thanks Sue!” said Sidney before playfully punching her brother on the arm, “C’mon Jojo, I call dibs on the one with more windows!”

“Hey, no fair!” cried Jonas, running after her, “you said I could pick the next time we got individual rooms!”

In the end, Sidney got the room with three windows. Jonas’s had slightly bigger space, so it seemed like a fair enough trade. Besides, Sidney promised him three IOUs if he let her have her room.

Well, technically one IOU since he could cancel out the two that he owed her.

As he packed the last of his shirts away in his dresser, Sidney shuffled into his room and flopped on his bed.

“Hey dude, did you pack my hairbrush on accident?” she asked, voice muffled from under his pillow.

“Nope. You said you were going to leave it next to the bathroom sink so you wouldn’t forget.” His  sister groaned at his remark, and Jonas tossed a pen onto her back, grinning. “Put it on the list, Sid. Did you leave anything else?”

“Just some markers, but that’s it. So, thoughts?”

“On what, the house?” Sidney grunted out a yes, and Jonas flopped next to her on his new bed. It was surprisingly soft, and the duvet had a fresh laundry smell. “Well, it’s pretty big, but I guess that makes sense since there’s ten people living here now. It’s a little weird how clean everything is, considering Sue said that most of the other kids here are like, younger than us.”

“Maybe that Dean fella whipped them into shape,” said Sidney, screwing her eyes shut, “I can picture it now; he’s telling a second grader to drop and give him fifty for not picking up his legos.”

“Hey, I’d tell a second grader the same thing if I ended up stepping on those things.”

“Sorry Jonas; a vacuum’s more intimidating to a kid than you.”

Sidney wore the biggest smirk as she watched her brother fumble with a comeback. Letting out one last sigh, she pushed herself off the bed and cracked her back, much to Jonas’s distaste.

“Well, I’m all done here. Ready to check out the Sellwood stores?”

“Yeah,” he replied, looking over his list. He mostly just wanted some new pens and a few new notebooks for school. Decorating his room could always come later.

As Sue called them from the downstairs banister, Jonas left his new room with the list in hand and hope in the other. He had a good feeling about the Wagners. The only two things left to experience was this Dean and their new high school, and in all honesty, Jonas had pretty good feelings about both. Tomorrow was going to be a good day, he just knew it.

\--

“Move it Fatass, you’re in the way.”

Jonas blinked at his locker. He had been struggling for a few minutes with the combination, wondering of the note the secretary gave him had the wrong numbers listed on it, and the sudden, nasally voice surprised him. Looking over his shoulder, his eyes settled on a group of three boys, nearly similar in style with blue blazers, sweater vests and dress pants.

“I’m sorry?” asked Jonas in confusion. The hallway, which was busy with dozens of students from the morning bus, suddenly seemed to be mostly empty, with a few kids giving wary or sympathetic looks towards his direction.

“Oh, he’s  _ sorry _ ,” sneered the one in the middle, blue eyes narrowing in glee. “Nice to know Fatso here already knows his place in the school.”

Nope. Jonas was not up for dealing with this bullshit today.

“Look,” he said, frowning up at the blonde boy, “It’s kinda rude to be giving out ‘chummy’ nicknames if you don’t even know my actual name yet, so I’m just gonna go back to opening my locker.”

As he turned his back towards them, Jonas was suddenly yanked backwards, and fell down with a yelp of surprise. The bigger of the three was holding his backpack in his hand, grinning menacingly as he began to look through his stuff.”

“Is that so?” continued the blonde boy, snatching the locker combination from Jonas’s hands, “Then let’s get acquainted. I’m Neil, and I run this school, Tubby. Augustus and Braxton here are going to be great friends of yours. Why don’t we help the new kid out, eh?”

“Hey, quit it!” cried Jonas, but as he tried to stand up, the thinnest bully pushed him back down with ease.

“Hey Neil,” he said, “This kid’s probably got more stomach than brains; wanna teach him how to open a locker?”

“Good idea Augustus. Let’s see, first, you need to empty out your bag.” At these words, Braxton, the bully holding Jonas’s bag, flipped it upside down, and all of the new supplies Jonas got came falling out.

Ignoring Jonas’s yells to stop, Neil continued, “Then you need to open up your locker. Let’s see, normally I would try stuffing you in it, but it’s obvious you wouldn’t be able to fit a leg in there. I guess it’s useless then.” And with that, Neil shredded the papers that not only held his locker information, but his class schedule and other information he needed to take back home.

Jonas watched the shreds of paper fall to the floor, not paying attention to Neil and his gang walk away laughing. They stepped on some of his pens, which cracked and leaked sticky blue and black ink on the floor, and at least one notebook was falling apart from how a twisting footstep nearly severed its spiral binding.

Taking the salvageable materials back into his bag, Jonas flinched at the ringing of the bell. First day and already late for class. Fantastic.

Hopefully Sidney had a better start to her day. Her locker was pretty much on the other side of the school, since “availability” was limited.

Something wasn’t right when Jonas slipped his backpack back on. It felt… lighter. Almost like he wasn’t carrying three textbooks he checked out from the front office.

…

His textbooks were missing.

Shit.

“This is great,” he muttered, peering into the nearest trash can from where Neil walked to. Nothing. Best bet was that it was in a different nearby trash can. Worse bet was that he officially lost them, and would have to ask Sue to replace the cost, after all she spent on him yesterday.

He didn’t notice the footsteps until they stopped directly in front of him.

“Are you, uh, okay?”

Looking up from the trash, Jonas saw a tall, skinny girl with a long skirt and cardigan peering back at him with just the faintest hint of judgement in her eyes. 

“I’m elbow deep in garbage looking for some textbooks I just lost, so yeah, I’m pretty dandy,” replied Jonas, brushing off shredded paper from his sleeves.

“Let me guess- Neil?” said the girl. She took Jonas’s grimace as an affirmation and rolled her eyes. “He’s nothing but a sad excuse of a bully who picks on everybody who’s not an anybody. I wish the administration would do something about him, but apparently his family owns like, more than half of Sellwood.”

“That’s insane.”

“Tell me something I don’t know. I’m Madison, but you can call me Maddy. I take it you’re Jonas?”

“Uh, yeah, how did you know my name?”

Maddy flashed him a proud blue braced smile, showing off the admin lanyard she wore around her neck. Five different keys and a swipe card jangled at the end. “I’m an office aide for this period. It’s part of my duties on student council. I’m supposed to show you around since you have a study period right now. Since you weren’t in study hall, I just assumed you got lost.”

“I, uh, kinda lost my schedule. And locker combo. And pretty much everything.”

“Oh. Well, no worries!” she shrugged, leading him to the main entrance of the school. “We can stop by the office after the tour; I can have them print you out another schedule, it happens all the time! Although for the textbooks...“ Her facial expression said it all: yikes.

Figures. Jonas took a closer look at some of the banners hanging from the school’s brick walls. He and Sidney were dropped off by Sue in the morning and told to just tell the office that they were the new students under the Wagner care, and spent most of the pre-homeroom time getting acquainted with the district's code of conduct. In other words, twenty minutes of their lives they were never going to get back again.

Apparently, the mascot was a mollusk. Not the worst possible mascot, but definitely not in the top one hundred either. 

“So is my sister coming on the tour too?” he asked Maddy as she walked him to the empty cafeteria, save for two janitors setting up the tables.

“She’s in a class right now, but I think next period is her free one, so another office aide will be giving her a tour. But I’m pretty sure we all have the same lunch time, so you two should totally join me! I’d love to get to know you better!”

Maddy seemed friendly enough, and having her around probably lessened the chance that Neil would bug him, so he agreed. Jonas saw where the gymnasium was, which doors led to the boy’s locker room, where the health classes shared their classroom space with the driver’s education class, which hallway contained the combination music and art classrooms, and after being asked by Maddy if he remembered any of his classes or teacher’s names, the best guess to where he would find their rooms. Their last stop was outside of his environmental science class on the second floor.

“... So I haven’t taken his class yet since I’m a junior, but Mr. Newman should be pretty good for an easy A, so long as you pay attention. He’s super old, but he’s not senile yet. And that’s pretty much it for the school’s layout. Any questions?”

He would ask Maddy to draw him a map of the school, but that may have been asking for too much. Sellwood High was deceptively bigger than what he thought it was going inside.

Jonas was about to say no when his eyes caught the stairwell up ahead. A string of ‘CAUTION’ tape and a good sized sign rattling off three days of in-school suspension was enough to make him curious. 

“Yeah, what’s on the third floor?”

“Hmm?” Maddy looked over and waved her hand dismissively, saying “Oh, nothing. It’s just more classrooms, but it’s been permanently closed off because we’re having serious flooding problems up there. I mean, not like that’s new or anything here.”

“Really?” said Jonas, looking up at the ceiling tiles for water damage, “I wouldn’t have thought flooding would have closed off an entire floor.”

“Oh, it’s not just that. Some delinquents are vandalizing the classrooms, breaking tables, messing things up, and it’s been going on for  _ years _ but none of the teachers have ever been able to catch them, so eventually they just closed off the third floor. Otherwise, I heard potential lawsuits could occur.”

“Years? That’s crazy. It is, like, multiple different people then?”

“I’m assuming so. I mean, everyone’s gotta graduate or dropout. But if you ask some of the more superstitious people here, they think it’s a ghost.”

“A ghost? Seriously?”

Maddy gave a disdainful snort with an equally (if not somewhat more impressive) eyeroll.

“ _ I  _ don’t personally believe in it, but I guess people can just make up whatever these days. Like, people have gone up there on dares, but they come back disappointed because all there is to see are some messed up classrooms.”

“Don’t they clean or empty out the classrooms since it’s closed off?”

“They try, but I guess students just come back to mess it up. I know a pair of keys went missing from the office two years ago so I wouldn’t be surprised if people came in the middle of the night to do it. They should honestly just move everything out at this point.”

Jonas hummed, eyeing the staircase one last time with interest. “Well, if it is a ghost, it’s gotta suck haunting the school. Doesn’t really seem like there’s a lot to do here.”

“Eh. You’re not wrong about that. Let’s get your new schedule.”

Madison reprinted Jonas’s schedule and locker combinations (the original numbers  _ were _ off by two digits) and the rest of his needed papers, and he promised to meet up with her at lunch to introduce his sister. As he went over his subjects again on his way to finally open up his locker, he was relieved to note that she had shown him almost all of the locations for the rest of the day’s classes. Except for history. He had no idea where history was.

Jonas stopped in his tracks when he turned into the hallway, surprise quickly turning into confusion.

Sitting neatly in front of his locker were the three missing textbooks.

**Author's Note:**

> The real scare here is the cost of textbooks.


End file.
